


5 Episodes That CSI's Ratings Were Never Low Enough To Air

by Rosencrantz



Category: CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
Genre: 5 Things, Tropes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-25
Updated: 2016-01-25
Packaged: 2018-05-16 02:14:59
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5809777
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosencrantz/pseuds/Rosencrantz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Tonight on CSI: You won't believe what happens! x5</p><p>Featuring those beloved television tropes:</p><p>Evil doubles<br/>Turned into children<br/>Time travel<br/>Identical cousin from England<br/>*aaand*<br/>Musical episode</p>
            </blockquote>





	5 Episodes That CSI's Ratings Were Never Low Enough To Air

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to my friends who laughed. Thanks to Vali for her betawork, and Diana and Ann for their readthroughs.
> 
> Thank you to the 90s.

"Griss! We can't fight them, they know our every move!"

Grissom peeked over his upturned desk at the figures marauding through the lab. They were the same as his team, down to the beyond-their-pay-grade fashion choices. Except one detail: Their glowing red eyes. And the rampant evil.

"They're obviously being powered by the Negadouble-Crystal we found earlier, Nick. We need to find that crystal and destroy it," said Grissom, ducking his head back down. "We haven't got much time - they're going to reach the evidence locker soon, and if they destroy that, we've lost the case."

Cath groaned. "But Greg dropped it in that barrel of other crystals! They're all black crystals! We'll never figure out which one it is!"

"I said I was sorry, okay!" said Greg. His head was in his hands. His double had ripped apart his brand new bag of Hawaiian coffee beans and flung them around the room, making this showdown expensive and coffee-scented. 

"But that's the thing," said Grissom. "All Negadouble-Crystals are unique. Like fingerprints. We can do this, guys."

"Look! When you combine the magnesium with the yavanite, the reaction is instant! From cockroach… to larva!" said Warrick, from his perch on the stool so he could reach the top of the table. He'd just finished showing Catherine the results of his experiment.

"And that explains how the killer's hands could fit in that space!" said Catherine, excitedly. She hitched up her OshKosh overalls which were slipping over one shoulder. They were purple and had a monkey on the front.

"And I bet if I could get my hands on some clay to neutralize it, I could reverse the effects!"

They exchanged tiny high fives.

Greg came into the lab and groaned when he saw Warrick and Catherine gathered around a smoking petri dish with Grissom Knows What in their hands.

"Guys! Guys, stop running off. You're supposed to be in Griss' office with the others. And you **know** you're not allowed to play with the equipment while you're uh… Rugratty," said Greg. "Also? Brass, whom you may know as the new responsible adult around here, says it's naptime."

Greg was one of the few who hadn't been caught in the wake of the explosive package that had reduced the CSI department to toddlers. His face was caught between manic laughter and horror. 

"It ain't naptime! We have a killer to catch, Greg!" said Warrick.

"He says you get really cranky without one, Warrick," said Greg, tucking them under his arms. "I'm sure you can 'solve the crime' when you're big again."

"Brass has it out for me!" complained Warrick. He squirmed and wiggled. "Cath! Get him in the kidneys! We've got to save the mayor from a two-foot terror!"

"Ow! GUYS!" Greg doubled up as Catherine landed a solid kick.

"We'll make it up to you later!" yelled Warrick as he raced out the automatic doors, Catherine hot on his heels.

"I get it now. If Frank Keaton kills his wife's boyfriend in the past, before Keaton's even born, he'll get away with murder! It's the perfect alibi!" Greg gasped.

Sarah put on the helmet to the time machine and strapped herself in.

"Not if we stop him. We have his prints. We can find Frank Keaton and save the future." 

"I call shotgun!"

"Not this time, Greg," she said. "I need you and Archie here in the present feeding me results about the evidence. This thirty year old crime is going to need to be solved - here and now, if it's going to be of any use to me in the past."

"Aw," said Greg. 

Sara warped out of time and Greg went to Archie's lab where the image tech was working on the evidence of Frank Keaton's 30 year old murder yet-to-be. All they had, so far, was Keaton's fingerprints and a grainy image from a security camera captured in the 80s.

"Zoom and enhance," sad Greg glumly.

_LAS VEGAS: 2:35 AM. A a car door slams. Inside the car is Jim Brass. And… Jim Brass?_

"Oh, I do say, Jimmy, we've gotten into quite a pickle!" said one of the Brasses, straightening his bowtie. The other Brass, the one behind the wheel, glared at him. His hand is gripped the bowtie'd Brass's collar. 

"We wouldn't be in a 'pickle', Willoughby, if you'd just stayed in the car like I told you," snapped Jim Brass, peeling out of the parking lot while the Mafia members fired on the car. He might have been driving one-handed, but Jim Brass was an old hand at getting in and out of law-related scrapes. 

"They simply said they wanted to say hello to the good Mr. Brass and I'm afraid you're not the only one who can lay claim to that title, chum," said Willoughby Brass, of Sussex England. He disentangled Jim's deathgrip from his prim suit, dusting it with one hand like it had American germs.

"And another thing," said Brass, taking a corner at speed, "Where do they get off taking me for you. I don't dress like… like whatever the hell you're wearing and I sure as hell don't look like you." 

A bullet whizzed through the back window and past Jim's ear.

"Hm, that delightful blonde vixen at your station said there was a striking resemblance. I do hope it was a compliment. Oh, mind the vagrant, Jimmy!"

The car swerved. Both Brasses tilted to the side.

"Gah!" yelled Jim Brass as they went off the side of an embankment. 

The car flipped. Willoughby and Jim Brass leapt out the car doors just in time as the vehicle went up in a burst of flames.

"My car!" Brass moaned as he gazed at the flames.

"You know what this means, don't you, old bean?" said Willoughby. He was dusting off his knees, none the worse for wear.

"That I have no car?" said Brass. "I gotta call this in…"

"That they think we're dead now! And two Brasses are better than one when it comes to solving a bit of the old Mafia stabbing, wouldn't you say?"

***

"So why was Brass all weird earlier?" asked Greg. He sipped his coffee, made a pained expression, then started blowing on the mug to cool it down. "Like, he called me a nice chap and told me to make him a 'spot of tea.' I didn't know Brass knew what tea _was_."

Breaktime in the lab was a calm affair. Montage music could be heard from the lab as test results were gathered about the stabbing of a Mafia bigwig.

"That was his cousin. From England. Let's not get involved," said Catherine. "If we do, Brass might transfer to another department. From shame."

"Family can bring out all sides of people. I'm sure Brass likes his cousin just fine," said Grissom, prepping a racing cockroach with tiny cockroach-friendly racing stripes.

Nick burst in.

"Did you hear? Brass went in after that Mafia don and they blew up his car and killed him!"

The racing cockroach gasped.

As the music died down, Warrick and Catherine were still holding hands and gazing into each other's eyes. The jazzy duet had briefly let them forget that they were tied up above an artisanal death trap from yet another dissatisfied former suspect.

Then they heard it.

The tipping.

The tapping.

Their prime suspect, Meredith Rhodes danced out, her tap shoes clicking and clacking on the floor, sparks rising up from their metal tips.

"That's right, CSI wunderkinds," she said, "this whole place is doused in gasoline and dynamite. If I go down, I'm going down dancing! Show's over, boys and girls!"

"Oh no you don't," sang a clear voice from the shadows. Grissom stepped out, hat in hand.

"Oh no you won't," from the other side. Sarah stepped into sight. silver-tipped cane in hand.

"Enough singing!" yelled Brass from the doorway and shot Meredith Rhodes in the leg.

"Fuckers!" yelled Rhodes as she went down.

"Someone read her the rights while I untie Warrick and Cath," said Brass. He stomped up to the hostages.

Warrick and Catherine muttered thanks and let go of each other. 

"Looks like she saved the last dance… for us," said Grissom wryly.

**Author's Note:**

> _Discarded episode ideas:_
> 
> **CSI: TRUE MEANING OF CHRISTMAS**  
>     
> Reason: I couldn't remember the true meaning of Christmas.
> 
> **CSI: GIANT ROBOTS**
> 
> Reason: 'Power Rangers' is more of a genre, than, say, a single episode concept.
> 
> **CSI: SUPERNATURAL CREATURE BUT NOT?**
> 
>  Reason: They did those ones on their own.
> 
> **CSI: ANTS**
> 
> Scenario: Nick has left the CSI department to Nick and Nora it up with the Ant Queen from that episode where he gets buried alive and the Ant Queen tries to make him her groom. Or something.
> 
> "More drinks, darling?"  
> "Chitterchitter *click* *click*"  
> "Ahaha, delightful."*
> 
>  Reason: This deserves its own spinoff series.
> 
> _Pseudo discarded:_
> 
> **Jim Henson's CSI: BABIES**
> 
>  Reason: Next life.
> 
> **CSI: DANCE FIGHT**   
>  **CSI: DOCTOR WHO CROSSOVER FOR RATINGS**
> 
> Reason: The dance fight is totally implied in musical episode and Archie is a timelord already.
> 
> _*Dialogue courtesy of[Phosfate](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Phosfate/)._


End file.
